One large services catering for many roads at once. It's located at M1 J23a but the junction has no north-facing sliproads, so traffic heading to/from the M1 north has to leave at J24 and use the parallel A453. It forms a gateway to The National Forest, and as such it has information boards and viewpoints round the back by the lake.

Trivia

Donington Park (commonly misspelt 'Donnington Park') considers itself to be the gateway to the National Forest, and at the back by the lake there are information boards and viewing platforms.

In 1989, before the A42 was built, a much smaller service area was proposed in the north-east corner of the roundabout.

On 21st May 2013, Harvester opened here on a trial basis. If it is successful, Moto plan to roll out Harvester across their network to replace Eat & Drink Co..

On the 25th April 2008 Greg James presented BBC Radio 1's Early Morning Breakfast Show (4-7am) live from the services.

A West Cornwall Pasty Company outlet opened here on Friday 4 April and is one of the two first internal West Cornwall Pasty Company outlets at a Moto site.

Building Design

The view from the in-built Travelodge.

The services were the first to be built with a design compared to that of an airport terminal which, albeit slightly modified, is still used by new services in 2013. It was billed by Granada as "a village by the roadside", aiming to reflect the wide range of facilities which would appeal to commuters.

It's the only service station where a hotel is built-in to the main building: some have access to the motel through the building, but few have the motel as a second storey. This design takes advantage of the fact few services had a hotel franchise from new, reducing the impact the construction had on the local environment.

Early Facilities

The services were one of the first sites to gain a Marks and Spencers - at its time it was the smallest of their stores in the world, but it was then extended and rebranded to M&S Simply Food. It was built where the Burger King was, and the Burger King was moved. A WHSmith store also opened here, replacing Birthdays and the Moto Shop.

When it first opened the forecourt had a dry cleaning and a photo development service, allowing commuters to stop by on the way to and from work. The Highways Agency had applied to build a regional control centre here in 2004, but it was refused.

Survey Results

In May 2012 and August 2011, Visit England rated the services as 3 stars and said it had a lot of sockets for business users. It also came top for rural access due to its proximity to the National Forest.

In 2006 the services won a four star loo award and were graded 3/5 by Holiday Which?.